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STEAM to Fuel Your Weekend – February 24

Between school, homework, practice and spending time with loved ones, it’s easy to miss out on the latest in science, technology, engineering, art and math. But don’t worry, Thinkery’s got you covered. Here are some of our favorite STEAM discoveries from the previous week. It’s fuel for your weekend.

Photo Credit: D. Finnin / AMNH via AP

Have you ever watched the movie Ice Age? You might remember Manny, the woolly mammoth! Sadly, woolly mammoths became extinct 4,000+ years ago, so it’s been quite some time since anyone’s laid their eyes on this massive species. However, Harvard professor George Church is leading a “de-extinction” team to bring back the woolly mammoth! His team is trying to create a hybrid embryo that combines mammoth traits with Asian elephant DNA, and it will take 2+ years to create this hybrid. Curious? Learn more!

Recently, a mysterious, and somewhat shocking, phenomenon was captured on video in Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire in the United Kingdom. Thousands of starlings were flying in formation and changing patterns simultaneously—looking just like clouds and patterns drifting in the sky. This phenomenon is called a starling murmuration. These “murmurations” tend to occur at dust, when the birds gather together for the night, and they can consist of a few hundred—or tens of thousands—of birds. The sudden formation and subsequent flight pattern often occurs to confuse predators, such as hawks.